Uncontrollable Hunger
by radredknuxfan
Summary: Sonic the Hedgehog has a secret. A secret that can lead to many bad things happening if it gets out. Will he be able to keep this secret, though, when people start to turn up dead by his own hands? Alternate take on the werehog. Rated T currently, but may be bumped up to M in the future. Please read & review!
1. Chapter 1

I doubt that any of you would know, but when I first started writing for this site, the first two fics that I did were Sonic the Hedgehog fics, and they were god awful, so I'm kind of glad I deleted them. Now, though, I'm finally back and new and improved, at least in my opinion. So, enjoy!

**NOTE: **When writing this, I wasn't sure if I was going to rate this as a T or an M, to be honest. I don't think this chapter's bad enough to make it an M, but if you guys think that I should change it to an M in future chapters, let me know and I will, because it might get a bit graphic. Keyword being might.

* * *

"Hello?"

It was a dark and stormy night inside the forest outside of Station Square. Everyone sane was asleep inside their homes right now, but there was one person that was still outside.

The man in question was trying to find his dog, who managed to slip out of his collar while the two of them were on a walk outside.

Even though he heard that there was going to be a huge thunderstorm coming through the city soon, the man ignored the warning bells that were going through his head, wanting to find the dog as soon as he could before he got too far ahead.

So, as he continued to chase the dog through the dark forest, his flashlight piercing through the nighttime, the rain continued to pound through the trees, drenching him.

"I really should have gotten my umbrella." he thought to himself.

Finally, after being forced to keep his jaw clenched to prevent his teeth from chattering, he was barely able to hear other noises besides the thunder.

However, what he heard made his blood run cold. There was a loud yelp, and the man immediately thought that it must have come from his dog.

Rushing towards the sound of the noise, the beam of his flashlight soon landed on a ghastly sight.

His dog was very much dead, the pool of blood forming around it giving a clear sign of what happened to the man. The shock of his dog turning up dead wasn't what made the man nearly tripped over his feet in an attempt to get away, though.

In the darkness above the dog was a pair of blinding white eyes focused right on the man. As the figure soon began to growl, one thing ran through the man's mind.

"Oh, shit."

The man shot off like a rocket, desperately trying to find his way towards the edge of the forest as the figure gave chase. Unfortunately, with each tree inside the forest looking exactly the same as the others in the darkness, the man soon became lost.

It didn't take long for the man to soon become gassed from the amount of running he was doing, and the figure soon caught up.

However, the man wasn't going to give up so easily. Changing direction, he slipped behind a bush and froze, hoping that he gave the monster the slip.

Listening carefully through the rain, the man heard the pounding footsteps of the monster grow faint. Thinking that he managed to escape, the man switched his light back on, only for it to short out.

Freaking out, the man whacked the side of the flashlight, hoping that the batteries haven't run out with him lost in the middle of a forest.

Finally, the light came back on just in time for him to scream as the monster pounced.

* * *

The morning soon came, and the forest was a cacophony of noise, as the police were searching for a man who was recently reported missing by his wife.

Unfortunately, even with the large amount of officers, it was a tough search, as there was a large amount of area to cover.

One of the officers, a man by the name of Berkowitz, was almost finished with covering his assigned section of the forest, with no luck. He reached over to the walkie-talkie on his shoulder, pressing the button on the side as he began to speak.

"CP, this is Officer Berkowitz. No sign of-"

Before he could finish his report, he felt his foot hit something soft. Ignoring the station's calls to finish his report, Berkowitz shined his flashlight in the area where his foot was, and his arm immediately went up to his face as he covered his nose from the smell.

"Ugh, that's disgusting."

In front of the officer was the dead body of the man, his entire chest cavity showing as clear as day to the officer.

"Come in, Officer Berkowitz! What's going on?" crackled the radio on his shoulder.

The officer stared at the scene in front of him before slowly reaching over to the radio.

"This is Officer Berkowitz. The missing person has been located."

* * *

The news soon spread like wildfire, as it seemed like practically every television in the city was tuned into the news about the death of one of their citizens.

The news even traveled to the outskirts of the city, where world-renowned hero Sonic the Hedgehog and his best friend Miles "Tails" Prower shared a house together.

Tails, taking a break from his usual tinkering on the Tornado, decided to sit down on the couch and turn the television on, figuring that some cartoons would help keep his mind off of the problem he was having with the propellers.

However, when he turned the TV on, the news was currently on. Tails was about to change the channel, when there was a story that piqued his interest.

"Hey Sonic! Come in here for a second!" he yelled into the room opposite from the workshop that he just left.

Tails braced himself, expecting Sonic to shoot in here and send everything in the room flying, but surprisingly Sonic walked into the room, looking curiously at the one who called him in.

"What's up, Tails? You need something?"

Tails shook his head.

"Check this out. Doesn't this look kind of strange to you?"

Tails gestured towards the TV, and as Sonic took a look at the news reporter gesturing towards the roped-off area of the forest, his normal calm and collected demeanor was replaced with a look of horror.

"Sonic? Are you alright?" asked Tails, having noticed the look on the hedgehog's face.

"Um…yeah. Yeah, I'm fine."

Sonic plastered a fake smile on his face, hoping that Tails wouldn't get any ideas.

"Alright, if you say so. Just let me know if anything's bothering you, okay?"

"Oh yeah, sure thing."

Tails continued to look at Sonic for a moment, unsure if his friend was really trying to hide something. Eventually, the two-tailed fox shrugged, focusing back on the TV as he changed the channel to something more interesting.

As for Sonic, he was desperately trying not to panic. Not wanting to attract any more attention from his friend, Sonic knew that he had to get out for a while, so he headed towards the front door, turning towards Tails as he had his hand on the door knob.

"I'm gonna head out for a bit. You gonna be okay on your own?"

"Yeah, I'll be good." said Tails, halfheartedly waving towards Sonic as his focus was on the show in front of him.

Trying to keep his hands from shaking, Sonic opened the door in front of him, heading through the doorway and shutting it behind him before rocketing off towards the city.

* * *

As Sonic ran through the city, hundreds of thoughts were swimming through his head, most of them consisting of him hoping that he wasn't the one who killed that man.

Pausing to rest for a moment, Sonic made sure he was hidden from view before removing his right glove and inspecting the bite mark on his hand.

You see, Sonic has a secret, one that not even his best friend Tails or even any of his other friends know about. He's not exactly the world-renowned hero and do-gooder that everyone knows him as, at least not since a week ago.

Ever since he was bitten by a rogue werehog that he managed to run into during a journey through Apotos, Sonic turns into one of those creatures each night, his mind going blank once the feral instincts kick in. Nothing ever gets in his way once he gains the power of the werehog, which unfortunately can lead to some wanton destruction. Thankfully, though, after a night where one of his transformations led to a hole in the wall of his house, he learned it was probably best to sneak out towards the forest every night once Tails was asleep so he didn't have to deal with having to explain the damage he caused.

He never remembers anything that happens during the night, though. The only way he gets any clue about what happened is when he wakes up in the middle of the forest once the sun comes up, disoriented and gloveless.

This morning in particular was sticking out pretty clear in Sonic's mind, though, because he woke up covered in blood. He was definitely shocked to find the state that he was in, but he was able to collect himself enough so that he could get home and get himself cleaned up. Getting all of the blood out of his fur proved to be an issue, though, due to how caked in it was. He did manage to get it all out, though, but the amount of time he spent in the shower led to some questions from Tails. Thankfully, though, at this point Sonic was a pro at making up good excuses, so he was able to get his friend off of his back, at least for now.

After getting a new pair of gloves on, Sonic sat in the kitchen, lost in thought as he wondered what exactly happened inside the forest last night. Of course, he was given the answer when the news came on, but it didn't make it any easier for him.

Anyway, this new revelation was starting to worry Sonic. He knew he had no control over his own actions when the werehog came out every night, so there was a good chance that anything that crossed his path while he was roaming through the forest wasn't going to leave. However, he had no idea that it was going to get as far as killing humans as well.

His head continuing to swim, Sonic sat down on the ground behind a dumpster, burying his head in his hands as he tried to process this new revelation. From what he could tell with the amount of the news report he actually listened to, the cause of death of the man hasn't yet been determined, so there was no way that the police would have had any idea of his existence inside the forest every night, and they wouldn't know to keep people away so that they would be safe.

Sonic knew, however, that he couldn't just reveal the fact that he was a werehog to everybody. There was no telling what the people would think knowing that their hero was a monster, not to mention what they'd think when they knew that he was the one who killed that man, though unintentionally.

Unable to think of anything that would help, Sonic decided that the best course of action would hope that the police would eventually get the idea and close off the forest.

Until then, he knew there was nothing he could do, so after standing up, Sonic rocketed off, deciding to head towards the crime scene to see if there was anything he could discern from what happened.


	2. Chapter 2

It was very quiet inside the forest near Station Square. The police were already finished with their investigation of the crime scene, so the only noticeable thing there was remnants of crime scene tape that the police failed to collect.

The silence was soon broken, though, when Sonic skidded to a stop just outside the boundaries of the scene.

"Good. No one's here." he said to himself after taking a look around the area.

Not wanting to cause any unnecessary damage by running, Sonic walked into the forest, clearly remembering the path that he took this morning to get out.

Eventually, he returned to the spot where he woke up this morning after changing back. He could still clearly see the dried blood covering the spot where he was lying, which made him sigh in relief when he realized that the police missed that section.

Sonic soon began walking through the forest, hoping that he would be able to find any sort of clues as to what exactly happened last night. Unfortunately for him, though, the police had already cleaned the crime scene out, so finding anything interesting was tough. He refused to give up, though, as he was determined to find out whether the werehog, and by extension himself, truly killed that man.

Sonic eventually found himself inside the clearing where he originally changed into the werehog last night, which was a surprise, as he remembered barely managing to stumble into said clearing as he tried his hardest to remain himself. Obviously, it didn't work out, but Sonic didn't want to dwell on that fact.

Deciding to take a look around, Sonic slowly walked around the clearing, looking for anything that seemed out of place. Eventually, his eye caught something, and he walked over to the object and picked it up. What he found, though, ended up proving something that he really didn't want to be true.

"Those are my gloves."

What Sonic held in his hand was indeed the pair of gloves he wore yesterday, or at least the shredded remnants of them. While they didn't exactly prove whether the werehog was involved with the man's death, Sonic began to believe that there was a good chance that it did happen.

His eyes soon began to water as the realization soon hits him.

"I killed a man."

Of course, he was well aware of the fact that he had no control over himself when he did savage that man, but that didn't make Sonic feel any better about it.

Dropping to his knees, Sonic looked down at his torn-up gloves, despondent as he tried to process what he'd done.

Time passed as Sonic wondered what to do next. As much as his brain was telling him to just turn himself in and hope that they understand, he knew that convincing them of something this outlandish was going to be completely impossible.

Sighing, Sonic stood up, carrying his old gloves with him as he walked, almost like a memento.

His mind was in a haze as he reached the exit of the forest. He didn't even bother running, which came as a surprise to some of the onlookers. Thankfully, though, they didn't notice the destroyed gloves in his hand, which by that point were balled up inside said hand, so when he finally found a garbage can, he tossed them in without anybody noticing.

However, as he headed back home, he failed to notice the sun starting to set, so when he was suddenly racked with pain, he realized that something was about to go wrong.

"Oh crap! I need to move!" he thought to himself.

Turning around, Sonic shot off back towards the forest, hoping that he would be able to make it before the transformation started.

Even though the pain was making it very difficult for him to concentrate on running, Sonic was somehow able to make it back to the forest, tripping over his feet and landing in a heap on the ground.

Sonic only managed to get a few seconds of rest before the changes began. Flipping over on to his back, Sonic gritted his teeth, trying his best not to scream as his skeletal structure morphed to handle the extra bulk that Sonic was about to have.

Closing his eyes in an attempt to block out the pain, Sonic could only feel the thick coating of fur sprout all over his body, feeling like constant pinpricks. He desperately wanted to scratch at it, but once he heard his gloves tear off and the claws grow out he knew it was a bad idea.

The last thing he remembered before his mind went blank was his now hypersensitive ears hearing the earsplitting howl he made.

* * *

The next morning came, and Sonic woke up disoriented just like he always has done. After managing to collect his thoughts, Sonic slowly managed to pick himself up off of the ground, which gave him an opportunity to see what the area around him was like. What he saw, however, made his breath hitch in his throat.

Just like the night before, there was a large pool of dried blood on the grass with a clean spot in the middle where Sonic formerly was. Freaking out, Sonic felt around on his body, hoping that he ended up inside the same clearing he woke up in yesterday morning.

Unfortunately, when his hand felt the crusty form of dried blood, he knew that something bad happened last night.

"Oh shit! Oh shit!" he said to himself, his hands going to his head as he panicked.

Desperately looking around the area, Sonic hoped to find any clues that showed what happened, but unfortunately nothing came up, which began to worry him.

Sonic really wanted to take another look around to see if he missed anything important, but he knew that he needed to get back home and get cleaned up soon if he was going to avoid attracting any unnecessary attention from Tails, so he quickly shot off towards the edge of the forest, running as fast as he could manage.

* * *

Sonic soon skidded to a stop outside of his and Tails' house a few minutes after leaving the forest. Freezing in place, he listened closely, hoping that his entrance didn't wake Tails up. Thankfully, Sonic didn't hear any footsteps, so he assumed that his buddy must still be asleep.

After carefully opening the door, Sonic slipped through and shut the door behind him, pointing himself towards the bathroom as he began walking, eager to get cleaned up.

However, before he could get far, Sonic's eye caught a figure lying on the couch. After looking closer, he soon realized that it was Tails.

"Oh no, Tails must have been up all night waiting for me to get home. How am I gonna explain this to him?"

Sonic's face fell as he watched the two-tailed fox's chest rise and fall with his breathing. He couldn't imagine what Tails must be going through with how he's been acting recently.

Eventually, Sonic soon realized that he needed to get into the shower. Having Tails wake up and see him covered in dried blood would probably end up freaking the poor kid out.

Creeping over towards the bathroom door, which was thankfully not closed, Sonic made his way through, closing the door behind him and turning the light on.

Sonic didn't immediately get in the shower, though, as he soon began studying his shoes for a few moments after removing them.

The only reason he was doing that kind of thing, though, is because he clearly remembered spikes sprouting out of the bottoms of his shoes as well as along the top in a straight line during one of his earliest transformations.

When he woke up the following morning, he admittedly thought it was a little strange that something like that would happen, considering his shoes weren't technically part of him. He eventually decided that it wasn't worth trying to figure out, though.

However, now he couldn't help but be curious. Turning one of his shoes over in his hand, he tried to see if there was something that enabled his shoes to make that kind of transformation, but it just looked like a normal shoe to him.

Sighing, Sonic set the shoe down on the floor in front of him before hopping into the shower, turning the water on and immediately setting to work on scrubbing out the blood.

* * *

It took a lot of work, but Sonic was finally able to clean all of the blood out of his fur. His arm worn out from the furious scrubbing he had to do, Sonic decided to stand there for a little bit and let the water run down his body.

While it did feel quite refreshing to the hedgehog, it didn't make Sonic feel any better after what he went through back in the forest. His constant worrying that he was a danger to everyone was starting to eat away at him, and he didn't know how long it was going to be before he finally snapped.

Sonic soon shut off the water and stepped out of the shower, shaking himself off before grabbing a towel and wrapping it around his waist.

Pausing once he reached the door, Sonic slowly opened it a crack and listened in, eventually managing to catch Tails' continued breathing.

Although he was still worried about his buddy, Sonic sighed in relief as he realized that his long shower didn't wake his buddy up.

Walking into his room, Sonic pulled open his drawer and grabbed another pair of gloves before soon realizing that there wasn't many left.

"Crap, I really need to buy more gloves. With the rate I'm going through them, they won't last very long." he thought to himself.

After heading back into the bathroom and sticking his shoes back on, Sonic walked into the main room and stood over Tails, who was still sound asleep.

"Jesus, how long was he awake?" Sonic thought to himself.

The sun had finally finished rising at this point, so Sonic was finally able to get a good look at his buddy, and he didn't look too hot. There were bags under the young fox's eyes, which Sonic at first thought was a symptom of his late nights working on his inventions, but he soon realized that his own strange behavior over the last week probably contributed to it as well.

Sonic also noticed that Tails was drooling into the pillow his head was up against, which was something he didn't remember Tails ever doing, but he assumed that it must be part of the lack of sleep as well.

Sighing, Sonic reached over and lightly shook Tails.

"Hey Tails! You awake, buddy?"

Tails soon awoke with a somewhat loud yawn, which even made Sonic wince. After managing to fully wake up, Tails looked over and saw Sonic's face in front of him, his eyes widening in surprise.

"Sonic! You're back!"

"Yeah, I am. Listen, I wanted to-"

Sonic's attempted apology was cut short, though, when Tails suddenly interrupted.

"Where the hell have you been? You said you were going to only be gone for a while, but I was waiting for you all night!"

Sonic opened his mouth to make another one of his prepared excuses, but his eyes widened when he realized that trying to find out what he killed last night made him completely forget about coming up with another excuse.

As Tails waited for Sonic's answer, impatiently tapping his foot, there was only one thing that was going through Sonic's mind.

"Oh, shit."


	3. Chapter 3

Sonic soon began to panic as he watched Tails grow increasingly impatient with having to wait for an answer as to his whereabouts.

"Uh…"

Tails sighed.

"Look Sonic, I know that you have your reasons for disappearing for long stretches of time. I completely understand. But when you say that you're just gonna be gone for a little while, and you come back the next day, then I know that something strange is going on. So please…just tell me what you were doing last night."

Despite Tails's attempt at telling Sonic that he wasn't going to be angry at him, he still failed to get an answer from the hedgehog, as Sonic was completely frozen in place, desperately trying to figure out a way out of having to tell the truth.

Thankfully for Sonic, that way out soon came, as the door suddenly burst open, revealing Knuckles, who appeared to be out of breath as he stood there in the door way.

"Guys! You really need to come see this!"

"We're kind of in the middle of something right now, Knuckles. Can it wait?" asked Tails.

"No, it can't. Now come on!"

Knuckles grabbed Tails's hand as he began leading the two-tailed fox away. As for Sonic, he sighed in relief, mentally thanking his friend for getting him out of the mess he got himself into…or at least he hoped that he did. That all depended on whether what Knuckles had to show would make Tails forget about his attempt at getting answers.

As for Tails himself, he quickly checked behind him to make sure that Sonic wasn't around before turning back towards Knuckles and speaking up.

"Hey Knuckles, hold up a sec."

Despite wanting to get to where he was going as soon as possible, Knuckles willingly stopped in his tracks, turning towards Tails as he waited to see what was going on.

"What's up?"

"Have you noticed something strange going on with Sonic recently? He's disappearing every night, and he doesn't show up again until the next morning."

"So? Doesn't he usually disappear for long periods of time sometimes?"

"Well, that's true, but he won't tell me where he's been going. Every time I try to ask, he's making up some kind of excuse."

Knuckles paused as he considered what Tails said.

"Well, I suppose I could keep track of him during the evenings. Maybe then we might get an idea about what he's up to."

"You'd do that for me?"

"Sure. It'd give me something interesting to do, I suppose."

"Great. Thanks, Knuckles. I really appreciate it."

Knuckles simply nodded, as he noticed Sonic coming out of the front door to join them.

"You guys still here? With how fast Knuckles has been dragging you out, I'm surprised you're not already halfway there." said Sonic.

"We, um…just got held up a little. Weren't you going to show us something, Knuckles?"

"What? Oh…yeah, of course." said Knuckles, not expecting to get pulled in to keeping Sonic unaware of their plans.

"Cool. Let's go."

Knuckles stepped out in front of them as he began leading Sonic and Tails towards the city.

* * *

At first, Sonic had no real clue as to what Knuckles had in mind when he told him and Tails about showing something to them, but when they were finally coming up to the boundary of the forest, he began to get an idea.

Sonic's eyes widened as he realized what was going on. However, as much as he now really didn't want to see what Knuckles wanted to show them, he knew quite well that running was just going to lead to more issues, so he stayed put, noticeably nervous as he followed the echidna.

"You guys see what's going on down there?" he asked as he turned towards the others.

"Yeah, they closed down the entrances to the forest. Apparently somebody else got killed while walking around inside." said Knuckles.

Although Sonic had a feeling that the blood he was covered in this morning was another victim, it obviously didn't make it any easier for him.

Sonic was definitely relieved that the police got the hint and closed off the forest, but that ended up leading to two problems that went through the hedgehog's mind.

One was that now he didn't have a straight shot into the forest to transform every night. With the amount of police that were probably gonna be watching the forest throughout each day, this meant that Sonic was going to have to sneak his way through to get in without exposing his secret.

"God, I hope that there's a way to get in." he thought to himself, hoping that he wasn't going to need to find another place to transform.

The second problem was that even if he did manage to get inside the forest each night, the police on guard might as well be as much of a victim as the others that the werehog has killed. Even worse, if the werehog managed to find an officer on the outskirts of the forest, there's no telling what kind of death and destruction the werehog would get into if he gets into the city.

Mentally shivering, Sonic tried his best to remain focused as he listened to the others continue talking.

"So…you're saying that you want to go down there and ask them what happened?"

"Yeah, I do. Do you have a problem with that, Knuckles?"

"No, I don't, but I doubt that even our status as world-renowned heroes would get us access to classified police documents. At least…outside of what we already know happened."

Tails sighed, realizing that Knuckles was right.

"Come on. Let's just go back home. Maybe we might get some details on the news."

Both Tails and Knuckles were about to head back when they soon realized that Sonic wasn't with them. Looking back, Tails noticed that Sonic hadn't moved, as he was seemingly lost in thought.

"Sonic? You coming?"

Sonic nearly jumped after hearing Tails's question, as he was in fact lost in thought trying to find an entrance to the forest that he could use tonight.

"What? Oh…sorry. I was just thinking about what happened in there."

Both Tails and Knuckles traded looks before deciding to ignore it. They began walking back towards the city, while Sonic fretted for a moment. He still had yet to find a suitable entrance to use, but he was already in deep with Tails, so staying behind was out of the question.

Sighing, he stood up as he began to follow the others back into the city.

* * *

Getting back home proved to be a little longer than it usually would have taken, considering Sonic didn't want to leave the others behind, and Tails and Knuckles didn't seem to be in the best mood to be dragged around at light speed.

They eventually did manage to get back to their house, though, and Knuckles decided to go ahead and stick around while Sonic reluctantly turned on the TV and changed the channel to the news.

Once the three of them finally sat down in front of the TV, they watched as the news reporter described the scene in front of her. With the news of another victim, the officer that she interviewed said that they didn't want to take any risks, so the forest was off limits until they dealt with who or what did these acts of violence.

Even though Sonic felt like he should have been a little nervous due to the fact that he was now being actively hunted by the police (though they don't know about it yet), a more prevalent thought went through his head, as he knew that they would probably get torn apart if they tried to do anything to the werehog.

Sonic began looking down at his shoes, downcast as he tried to figure out a different course of action. If he continued to go to the forest, it was most likely going to end with the death of an officer, and despite the fact that he had no control over his actions when the werehog took over, he'd never be able to forgive himself if that happened.

However, with the amount of times that he's ran around Station Square and the area around it, he had a pretty good idea of the lay of the land. Unfortunately though, he had absolutely no idea about any other possible places that he could go and transform in relative isolation.

"Dammit, I've been around this state hundreds of times! I should remember where most anything is, especially forests!" he thought to himself.

Unluckily, Sonic continued to blank out on possible destinations, so he decided to go with the next best thing and look it up.

As he stood up and began walking into the next room over, he silently thanked Tails for putting together that computer a few days ago. While Sonic wasn't exactly the most tech-savvy person in the world, he had a basic idea of how to work them.

So, after a quick search, he successfully managed to find a suitable place.

"Not too far away…Out of the way of any towns…sounds like a perfect place to hide out." he said to himself quietly.

Shutting the computer down, he walked back into the main room only to find Tails and Knuckles not on the couch. Sonic was wondering for a moment exactly where they went, but before he could really get lost in thought trying to figure that issue out, the setting sun suddenly caught his eye, and he immediately started freaking out.

"Oh crap, I need to go! Hopefully that forest isn't hard to get to." he thought.

He didn't want to risk valuable time trying to find Tails to tell him where he was going, so despite the fact that he knew that he was going to be in for it tomorrow, he quickly opened the door and shut it behind him, shooting off in the general direction of the forest he found.

Unfortunately for Sonic, in his haste to get out of the city, he failed to notice Knuckles who was sitting on the rooftop meditating.

Knuckles opened one eye when he heard the door open and close. Slowly picking himself up off of the roof, he looked down and noticed Sonic just as he shot off towards his destination.

"Let's see just where you're going, Sonic."

Knuckles jumped off of the roof, gliding in the direction Sonic went, while in his mind he wondered just what kind of things that Sonic was truly up to.


	4. Chapter 4

Knuckles knew full well that he didn't really have a chance keeping up with Sonic, especially when the hedgehog is going full speed. One of the friendly races that he had with him proved that point pretty well to the echidna.

As he began gliding, a thought went through his mind that trying to follow Sonic was a waste of time considering he could easily lose half the people in this city in seconds. However, in a stroke of luck, the speed that Sonic was going at meant he ended up leaving a pretty clear trail in the ground behind him.

"Can't get away from me that easily, Sonic." he said to himself as he began following the trail.

Said trail eventually grew cold, but not before Knuckles found himself in front of a large forest that was well outside of town.

"A forest? What kind of business would Sonic have in a forest?" he said to himself.

As Knuckles stared into the depths of the forest, he considered going in and trying to find Sonic himself, but he soon realized that it was getting way too dark. Attempting it at this time of night would only end with him getting hopelessly lost, and he wanted nothing to do with that.

Sighing, he decided simply to wait for Sonic to appear and hope that he would be able to get some answers that way. So, after climbing up a tree on the edge of the forest, Knuckles sat down on one of the branches and watched.

Unfortunately, nothing seemed to happen at first, and Knuckles, bored, felt his eyes start to droop. As much as he didn't want to miss anything from within the boundaries of the forest, he decided that at this rate there probably wouldn't be anything going on.

Making himself as comfortable as he could, Knuckles closed his eyes, and began taking a nap, thinking that he would take a quick one and still be good.

However, Knuckles didn't really get a chance to fully go to sleep, as he was awoken with a start by a loud howling noise.

"What the-"

Knuckles nearly fell out of the tree, but he managed to catch himself just in time. After pulling himself back up, he took a look around the area, trying to figure out where that noise came from.

"What in the world was that?"

Knuckles could easily recognize the fact that the noise was a howl, but the thing that confused him was that it sounded nothing like a regular wolf howl.

Slightly nervous, Knuckles debated on whether or not to check the noise out. Eventually, his curiosity overrode his sense of self-preservation, and he hopped down from the tree, landing on his feet in front of the forest.

"Just go in and out. Easy enough. Can't be too much harder than taking on Eggman."

Despite his attempt to talk himself into it, Knuckles's heart was hammering in his chest, as he had no idea what to expect inside the forest.

Breathing in and out to calm his nerves, Knuckles finally began making his way into the trees.

* * *

Time passed as Knuckles walked through the forest, his ears straining for any kind of sign from who or what made that howl. However, his mind wasn't completely focused on trying to find it, though; as he realized very early on that he was risking getting lost inside the forest.

When Knuckles came up on the forest while following the trail Sonic made, he found that it was actually a pretty big forest, which while it wasn't a big surprise to him, it does bring up the fact that it would take a while to make your way through from one side to the other.

So, while he was listening for whoever made the noise, he did not deviate an inch from the path that he was taking, except for whenever there was a tree in the way. In that case, he simply walked around it and continued on his way.

Eventually, Knuckles reached what seemed to him to be the center of the forest. He was obviously expecting to have run into at least something, if not what he was looking for by now, but for some reason, the path that he went through was completely empty.

"Hmm, that's strange. I know I've only gone in a straight line, but I should've seen something by now." he said to himself.

Knuckles was about ready to give up his search and head back to the entrance to wait for Sonic to show up when he suddenly heard another howl.

Freezing, Knuckles strained his hearing once more, hoping to see where the noise came from, but it didn't take long before he heard the sound of growling.

"Who's there?"

Knuckles's head snapped from side to side, desperately looking to see where the growling was coming from so that he wouldn't be ambushed.

However, in a moment that surprised even Knuckles, the figure revealed itself to be the werehog. Unfortunately, Knuckles didn't know that, and he ended up letting down his guard for a moment as he tried to process what was in front of him.

As the two figures had a standoff across from each other, Knuckles was trying as hard as he could to keep his composure while the monster continued to growl. He quickly noticed the sharp claws and sharp teeth on the monster, but the thing that really freaked Knuckles out was that the eyes on the monster were completely white. There was no sign of a normal eye anywhere.

"What do you want?" asked Knuckles, his voice shaking.

The monster didn't answer, obviously. Instead, it lunged towards Knuckles.

Caught off guard, Knuckles barely had time to drop to the ground, the monster sailing harmlessly over his head as he hit the grass below him.

Picking himself up as quickly as he could, Knuckles raised his fists. He knew full well that it being able to defend himself was going to be tough, but running wasn't an option. He already lost track of where he was in the forest thanks to the monster's appearance, and trying to escape would probably only get him killed faster.

The monster paused for a few seconds, looking at Knuckles in confusion before pouncing again. However, this time Knuckles was ready.

Rearing back, Knuckles's fist flew forwards, successfully connecting with the monster's face and sending it flying back with a yelp. This only managed to piss the monster off, though, as Knuckles noticed that it only took seconds for the monster to get back to its feet, growling even louder.

Unsure about what to do, Knuckles decided it was probably best just to go on the offensive and hope that it would hold the monster off long enough for him to escape.

Rushing forwards, Knuckles reared his fist back once more, letting it fly towards the monster. However, just like with Knuckles, the monster was ready for the echidna's attack.

Launching off of the ground, the monster flew into the air for a few moments as Knuckles's attempted punch hit air. Expecting the attack to hit, Knuckles looked around, wondering where the monster went when it suddenly dropped down to the ground behind him.

Knuckles barely had time to turn around and attempt a punch before the monster slashed out with its claws, catching Knuckles right in the chest as he howled out in pain.

Dropping to the ground, Knuckles clutched as his chest as he felt the blood start to drip from the claw marks.

Sensing victory, the monster padded up to Knuckles on all fours, intending to finish the echidna off and have him for lunch. Knuckles had no intention of dying, though.

Despite the pain he was in from the claw wounds, he opened both his eyes, thrusting himself forward as he head-butted the monster in the chest. Caught off guard, the monster was stunned for a moment before recovering, somehow even more pissed off than he was before.

Rearing back, the monster attempted another pounce, hoping to pin Knuckles down so that it could finally finish the echidna off. By this time, though, Knuckles had managed to pick himself up, and when he saw the monster flying towards him, he immediately reacted.

Timing it perfectly, Knuckles jumped up, connecting with a perfect uppercut and sending the monster sprawling.

This time, instead of getting back up with a renewed vigor, the monster stayed down for the count. Knuckles immediately set off running, not wanting to risk wasting any valuable time with the monster being down.

Unfortunately, he soon began to realize that the wounds on his chest weren't the only thing that was hurting. Knuckles felt his ankle beginning to throb, and he wondered for a moment how he managed to roll it before realizing that he needed to focus on getting out of the forest and away from the monster before thinking about anything else.

Thankfully, the adrenaline helped dull some of the pain that Knuckles was going through, but when he finally got out of the forest and into the countryside between it and Tails's house, the pain returned in full force and he was reduced to a hobble.

Knuckles still refused to give up, though. Despite knowing that he was probably going to end up doing more damage to his ankle, he still was going as fast as he could manage, glancing back every so often to make sure that the monster wasn't still following him.

Eventually, Knuckles soon realized that he must have lost the monster, and he took it as an opportunity to rest. Sitting down on a patch of grass, Knuckles felt his ankle, grunting in pain when he attempted to lightly squeeze the limb.

"Well, that's gonna make it tough to get home." he said to himself.

Home was second, though, as he wanted to relay what he had learned to Tails. Stumbling to his feet, he slowly limped his way towards Tails's house, doing his best to ignore the pain coming from his ankle and the claw marks on his chest.

Speaking of the claw marks, Knuckles soon began to realize that he was losing too much blood when he pulled his glove away from his chest to find it covered with blood. Swearing, Knuckles picked up the pace despite his bad ankle.

"I've got to get to Tails fast before I collapse."

Knuckles did eventually manage to make it to Tails's house, but by that point he was barely managing to stand on his feet. Collapsing against the door, Knuckles reached out and turned the door handle, letting his weight open the door as he fell to the floor with a grunt.

Now, Knuckles had no idea what time it was, so as he lied on the ground in front of him, he hoped that the noise he made would wake Tails up if the two-tailed fox wasn't awake already.

Thankfully, Tails was awake, as he was too worried about what was going on with Sonic to go to sleep. As he walked into the living room, wondering what that noise was, he noticed the barely moving form of Knuckles on the floor.

"Knuckles, what are you-"

At first, he wondered what Knuckles was doing on the floor, but when he noticed the blood start to pool around him, Tails freaked out.

"Oh my god! Knuckles!"


	5. Chapter 5

Sonic woke up in the morning as he always has done recently, inside a random clearing with absolutely no idea of how he got there. This time, though, Sonic's gotten pretty used to having to deal with this every night, so he simply picked himself up and brushed himself off.

However, when he moved his hands towards his body to straighten himself out, he noticed an abundance of red on both of them. Pausing, he raised his hands to eye level to check them out, and mentally swore to himself when he realized that it was in fact dried blood.

"Oh no, did someone come into this forest last night? This was supposed to be nowhere near any towns!" he thought to himself.

Trying not to panic, Sonic studied the area he woke up in a little more thoroughly, only to be surprised when there was way less blood than there was during his last couple episodes.

Confused, Sonic looked down towards his body, only to find that outside of his hands, he was mostly clean, which caught him off guard.

As he began making his way towards the entrance of the forest to head back home, he soon began to realize that whoever the werehog attacked last night may still be alive. It was a small comfort to Sonic, but it was a comfort nonetheless.

Picking up speed, Sonic finally exited the forest and made his way towards Tails's house, hoping that Tails was still asleep so that he could sneak in and get his hands cleaned off before he noticed.

Once Sonic finally managed to reach the house, he came to a stop to prevent himself from making too much noise. This was a smart decision, though, as Sonic noticed the open doorway, as well as the haphazardly cleaned up pool of blood inside said doorway.

Sonic soon began to get worried when he also noticed a streak of blood on the door itself. However, in the state he was in currently, being gloveless and covered in blood, walking in would cause more trouble than he wanted, so after quickly making up his mind, he turned around and walked off, heading for the nearest source of water.

Thankfully, he managed to find a stream not too far from the house, and Sonic immediately went to work scrubbing at the offending stains.

It took way less time for Sonic to get himself cleaned thanks to the lack of blood on his person, so once he was finally satisfied that there were no bloodstains anywhere, he began walking back towards his house.

* * *

When Sonic finally returned home, there was no change from when he initially got back, so he took it as a sign that his short trip to the stream went unnoticed.

As Sonic slowly began walking towards the doorway to finally find out what was going on, he reached out with his hand to knock on the doorframe and announce his presence. However, he successfully managed to catch himself before he could knock, when he remembered that he still did not have any gloves on, and his bite mark was showing as clear as day to anyone looking.

Sonic considered heading back out to grab a new pair of gloves, since he was already planning on getting more, but before he could do so, Tails suddenly appeared in front of the doorway, wide eyed as he took in the hedgehog in front of him.

"Sonic, you're back! Where have you been? And where are your gloves?"

Too tired to think of a good excuse, Sonic decided to go with the best one that popped into his head.

"Just needed some fresh air. Summer's just starting, warm weather and all that. This is the season to spend more time outside than in, you know."

Tails immediately saw through Sonic's weak excuse, considering he still believed that he was hiding something from him, but for now the two-tailed fox decided to play along. However, Sonic still didn't answer his question about the gloves, and Tails gestured towards Sonic's hands to emphasize that issue.

"Oh, that's right. I don't have any gloves on. I…actually tore them up on some low hanging branches as I was running through a forest. Had to throw them out. If you don't mind, I'm just gonna run into my room and grab a new pair."

Tails caught the pause in Sonic's explanation, and considered calling him out on it, but before he could do so, Sonic shot past him and into his room, coming out a few seconds later with a new pair of gloves on, looking noticeably less tense than he was when Tails initially saw him.

Tails quickly made a mental note to ask him about it before Sonic suddenly spoke up once again.

"So, what's with all the blood? I didn't realize that you were getting into working on actual people."

Sonic was noticeably trying to lighten the mood by joking around, but Tails unfortunately wasn't in the mood to joke around, especially after spending the night awake.

"I'm not. Knuckles showed up super late last night bleeding to death. Frankly, I was lucky that I had some spare medical supplies lying around, or he wouldn't have made it through the night. And I'm not even a doctor!"

Sonic's face immediately fell when confronted with this revelation. As much as he wanted to believe that Knuckles must have gotten into some kind of accident, Sonic was beginning to believe that he may have had the echidna's blood on his hands, which frightened him greatly.

"Where is he?" asked Sonic, his voice coming in barely a whisper.

Tails was about to simply answer Sonic, when he noticed the frightened look on the hedgehog's face.

"You okay, Sonic? You don't look too good."

Sonic's mind was completely on Knuckles's well-being, knowing that he may have had a hand in his current condition, but he somehow managed to pull himself into the present enough to answer Tails.

"I…I don't know. I just…I didn't expect to hear someone like Knuckles would be hurt this badly, judging from the amount of blood I saw over there around the door."

Tails looked over towards the doorway and noticed the blood still caked around that area.

"Oh, yeah…blood can be kind of hard to get out of wood. I got most of it out, but there's still some left."

Sonic glanced over to the doorway and winced, wondering how much blood Knuckles lost inside that doorway.

"So, where is he? I want to see how he is."

"Inside my room. He would've been on his way to a hospital, but since we're kind of well out of the city, it makes it a little difficult for ambulances to get here quickly, especially considering it's all the way on the other end of the city."

"Yeah, that's true. Maybe we should think about moving a little closer to the city. It'll make things easier on us getting in and out when we need to." said Sonic.

Tails paused, considering Sonic's proposal.

"Maybe. I don't want to be busy trying to move all of our stuff if something happens to come up."

Sonic shrugged, conceding Tails's point. He remained silent, though, as his mind wasn't really focused on the conversation in front of him.

After a few seconds of giving the proposal some thought, Sonic decided to leave it until later, turning towards Tails as he changed the subject.

"How is Knuckles, anyway? Judging from the doorway over there, it doesn't sound too pretty."

"Well…he's still breathing. I'm not a doctor, so I don't know if there's anything else wrong with him besides the blood loss, but for the most part I managed to stop him from bleeding to death."

Sonic sighed, relieved that Knuckles managed to somehow escape the werehog's wrath. However, before he could start to make his way into Tails's room to see the incapacitated echidna, Tails continued speaking.

"I did notice something kind of strange, though. When he first showed up here this morning, I thought he just cut himself on something really badly, but when I got a good look at the wound, I saw five long gashes across his chest."

Sonic suddenly became nervous as Tails spoke, hoping that he wouldn't put two and two together. Thankfully, though, Tails failed to notice Sonic's expression, as he was too engrossed in his explanation of Knuckles's state.

"Anyway, I thought that there was no way that any normal animal could make that many marks at once. There's got to be something weird going on, but I can't figure out what."

Tails was definitely well aware of the fact that he could simply ask Knuckles what he saw once the echidna woke up, but since Sonic didn't know about it, he couldn't just out and say it without Sonic getting suspicious.

To the fox's surprise, though, he didn't even have to worry about trying to hide that fact, as Sonic suddenly spoke up.

"Well…maybe once Knuckles wakes up we can ask him some questions about what he saw."

Tails didn't answer immediately, as he was completely caught off guard.

"I…I suppose we can do that. I think we should at least get him to a hospital, though. I did do my best with him, but I'm sure you'll agree with me that it'd be best to have a professional look at him."

"Yeah, I agree with that. I would still like to see him first, though."

Tails simply nodded, allowing Sonic to pass by him as the hedgehog slowly made his way towards the fox's room.

* * *

When he finally reached said room, he found that the lights were off. Although Sonic was slightly annoyed that the lack of light would make things difficult to see, he could understand that having the light on would probably not help Knuckles very much.

What came as a surprise to Sonic, though, was the state of the room itself. Now, Sonic always knew Tails was a bit of a neat freak when it came to stuff outside of his workshop, but the amount of blood that Sonic saw covering Tails's bed was staggering to him. Frankly, it was a miracle that he managed to save the echidna's life.

After mentally thanking Tails for preventing something that Sonic would never be able to forgive himself for, he carefully walked towards the bed, not wanting to make any noise despite not knowing if Knuckles was asleep or still passed out.

Once Sonic finally reached his bedside, he stared down at the thankfully still breathing form of Knuckles, a frown etched on to his face as he reflected on how close he was to losing one of his friends.

Finally, Sonic really felt that he needed to say something despite the chance that Knuckles wouldn't be able to hear him. However, since he knew that he would probably end up exposing his secret if he spoke, he remained silent, choosing to say his apology mentally.

"I'm sorry, Knuckles. I know I have no control over the werehog, but that still doesn't make me feel any less horrible for nearly getting you killed. God, I wish I never went to Apotos that night."

Sonic knew it was too late to regret making that fateful decision, but it still didn't prevent him from wishing that things would change and he could focus on having a normal life instead of worrying whether any of his friends would show up dead the next morning.

Sighing, Sonic turned around and headed back out of Tails's room, too lost in thought to notice Tails trying to tell him that he called an ambulance for Knuckles.

As Sonic walked past him, Tails couldn't help but notice the expression on Sonic's face. The look of despair on Sonic's face despite knowing that Knuckles still had a pretty good chance of living made Tails curious to see what was going through the hedgehog's mind.

As much as Tails wanted to ask him about it, the two-tailed fox knew that they needed to concentrate on getting Knuckles to a hospital so that he would be able to make it, so he pushed that thought to the back of his mind as he headed outside to wait for the ambulance's arrival.


	6. Chapter 6

Thankfully, the ambulance arrived soon after Tails made the call to the hospital, and as the two of them watched their friend be carried away, Sonic's expression remained blank despite the torrent of thoughts going through his mind right now.

One thought, however, was prevalent though the entire mess.

"How did he find me? Does he know about my condition?"

Sonic was mostly sure that Knuckles wasn't any more aware than Tails was about his "problem", considering he's done so well hiding it from them, but this still didn't explain how he supposedly managed to find the exact forest that he was using to spend the night in and end up running into him while he was the werehog.

Sonic gave an involuntary shiver at the thought that he couldn't even be sure that his friends would be safe, which unfortunately was noticeable enough that Tails looked over towards him, curious.

"You okay, Sonic? You look a little out of it."

Unaware that Tails noticed his actions, Sonic nearly jumped in fright, but he managed to catch himself in time to hopefully prevent Tails from becoming suspicious.

"What? Oh, um…it's nothing, really. I'm just a little worried about Knuckles."

Sonic attempted to make his expression neutral enough to hide what he was really thinking, but Tails, not wanting to simply drop the subject, decided to prod him a little more.

"Sonic, please. Your excuses are really starting to get a little tiresome. Just tell me what's going on."

Sonic's eyes suddenly widened as he realized that Tails just might be catching on to his secret.

"Oh shit! Oh shit! What do I do?" he thought, panicking.

In a desperate attempt to divert Tails's suspicions, Sonic decided the best course of action was to go on the defensive.

"I told you, Tails. I'm just worried about Knuckles. Can't a guy be worried about his best friend nearly bleeding to death?"

As much as Sonic tried to sound annoyed, his voice was still shaking enough that Tails could easily see through Sonic's attempt at bravado.

Tails gave Sonic an unimpressed look, crossing his arms as he tapped his foot, waiting for Sonic to fess up.

"Come on Sonic, you can do better than that. Give me the truth, already!"

With his first option completely botched, Sonic had to go to his last resort, shutting up.

The two friends were silent as they stared at each other, Sonic refusing to say anything while Tails waited for Sonic to confess.

Unfortunately, Sonic was stubborn, which meant that as much as Tails wanted an answer out of the hedgehog, they would be standing there all day.

"Ugh, fine! I'll drop it for now. Mark my words, though. I will find out what your problem is, one way or another." said Tails, pointing a finger into Sonic's face for emphasis.

Unimpressed by Tails's threat, Sonic pushed the fox's finger out of the way before giving him a flat look. However, he still remained silent, as he knew that he had to be walking on eggshells around Tails now that he was catching on.

"Come on, let's go to the hospital. I imagine that Knuckles must be there by now."

As the two of them began walking towards the city, Sonic felt that he needed to say something to defuse the tension between the two of them.

"Hey, Tails?"

Tails didn't answer, instead simply glancing towards Sonic before looking forwards once again. Sonic sighed, thinking that his friend probably hates him now.

"Look, I'm sorry, Tails. I wish I could tell you, but it's not safe for you to know-"

"Sonic, please! You've given me that excuse hundreds of times in the past, and I'm really tired of it! Let's just go." said Tails, exasperated.

"Can we at least try not to cause a scene in public?"

Tails stared at him for a second before sighing.

"Fine."

Without waiting for an acknowledgement, Tails began walking down the road towards the city, Sonic following a few seconds later.

* * *

The journey towards the hospital was pretty uneventful, as Sonic and Tails were completely silent the entire way there. Tails was still very mad at Sonic for hiding stuff from him, while the hedgehog was doing his best to avoid standing near Tails, not wanting to set him off even further.

Finally, the two of them reached the hospital, and Tails led the way as they made their way to the receptionist.

"Excuse me, we're friends of Knuckles. Is there any word on how he's doing?"

The receptionist, a surly-looking black woman, gave the two of them a look before turning towards her computer, typing furiously as she searched for the name.

"Looks like your friend just got out of surgery. If you'd like, I can call the doctor and he can tell you what's going on."

"That'd be great. Thanks."

Even though she didn't look too thrilled to be doing so, the receptionist grabbed the phone and pressed a couple of buttons, waiting as it rang.

"Doctor Julian? There's some friends of that echidna that just came in today here. They want to find out how he's doing…Okay, I'll tell them."

The receptionist hung up the phone before turning back towards Sonic and Tails.

"The doctor said he's gonna come meet you as soon as he's done with his final paperwork. If you two wouldn't mind sitting down, he should be out shortly."

"Thanks for the help, miss." said Tails.

"Mm-hm."

Sonic and Tails sat down on two of the available seats, although when Sonic looked over to see how he was doing, he was dismayed to find out that there was at least two empty seats between them.

Sonic considered moving over, but with how angry that Tails was at him at the moment, he thought to himself that it wasn't exactly the best idea. So, sighing, he faced forwards, twiddling his thumbs as he tried to figure out a way to keep himself occupied.

Thankfully, he didn't have to think about it too long, because a doctor came through the double doors off to the side of the seating area, pausing a moment as he looked around to find someone. Eventually, his eyes landed on Sonic and Tails, and he began walking over to meet them.

"Hello, I'm Doctor Julian. I was the leading physician when we were working on your friend." said the doctor as he shook Sonic's hand.

"Nice to meet you. So, how is he, doc?" asked Sonic as Tails joined them, albeit at a distance.

"Oh, he should be fine."

Both Sonic and Tails traded glances, relieved that Knuckles was going to be alright.

"He did need a blood transfusion, but luckily we had some of his type in stock. Unfortunately there will be some scarring with the wounds on his chest, but outside of that he should be back to normal within a day or two, at least once the ankle heals."

"That's great! Can we go visit him?" asked Tails.

"I'd love to be able to let you guys go, but visiting hours are over, and I can't really make any exceptions. Sorry about that."

"It's fine, doc. We'll come back tomorrow." said Sonic, as he beckoned towards Tails, and the two of them headed out of the hospital.

As they began heading back towards home, Sonic couldn't help but voice his feelings to Tails, despite not knowing whether he was going to set off another argument or not.

"Man, Tails, it's great that Knuckles is going to be okay. I was a little worried when I saw how he looked this morning."

Tails didn't answer immediately, which worried Sonic a little, as he began to think that Tails was still refusing to talk to him. However, to the hedgehog's surprise, Tails spoke without a hint of animosity, almost like nothing had ever happened between them.

"I know, but it kind of makes me wonder what happened to him that made him end up in that kind of condition. As far as I can think of, there aren't really any wild animals that can make those kinds of markings. This is really starting to get strange."

Caught off guard by the sudden change of subject, Sonic had to be careful with what he said next.

"Uh…I suppose so. What do you think could have done this?"

Tails looked towards Sonic and saw that the hedgehog was trying his best to keep his composure together. Narrowing his eyes in suspicion, Tails considered confronting him on it, as he believed that Sonic might know something about this, but then he soon realized that all he would get was Sonic clamming up again.

So, Tails remained silent, choosing to simply shrug before they continued walking down the road out of the city. Meanwhile, inside his brain, he decided that he was going to have to be a little more subtle about it if he was going to get some answers.

* * *

When Sonic and Tails finally returned to their house, Sonic hopped on to the couch and flipped on the TV, while Tails decided to go into his room for some privacy.

Making a mental note to clean his now bloodstained sheets, Tails closed the door behind him before pacing back and forth within the room, trying to figure out a way to find out what Sonic was up to without actually confronting him directly.

Sonic could be a pretty crafty guy if he really wanted to, considering the amount of excuses that the hedgehog managed to come up with when Tails confronted him after his overnight expeditions became much more numerous.

Tails mentally kicked himself for believing Sonic so easily at first. He had absolutely no idea what came over him.

"Maybe I just got used to the fact that he leaves so often." he said to himself before continuing to pace.

Eventually, after delving into each of the aspects of how Sonic has been acting over the last couple of weeks, his mind soon latched on to one single factor.

"Of course! Sonic always has to leave every night. There must be something going on that he has to do that!"

Admittedly, at first he had no idea that Sonic wasn't spending each night inside his room, but after the incident with the hole in the wall, Tails had a bit of trouble sleeping due to the fact that he was worried about somebody breaking in while the hole was being repaired, so he ended up sleeping on the couch. That was when he began hearing who he eventually figured out was Sonic sneaking out of the house every night.

After giving it some thought, Tails decided that, as much as with what happened to Knuckles worried him, he knew that he was going to have to follow Sonic to wherever he was going if he was going to find out what the hedgehog was up to.

So, despite his gut feeling that he was risking his life doing this, Tails hopped into his bed, pretending to go to sleep as he listened intently for any sign of Sonic preparing to leave.

* * *

**Okay, before I go, I really wanted to apologize for keeping you guys waiting for so long. I had a massive bout of writer's block (with pretty much all of my stories), and I had absolutely no idea of how I was going to continue on for a while without writing myself into a corner. Thankfully, I've managed to figure it out, and hopefully this means that I should be getting back to a regular schedule.**

**So, once again, I'm sorry for the wait. If you're still interested in reading this, thank you, and I'll see you again next time.**

**RK**


	7. Chapter 7

Later that night, just as Tails figured would happened, he heard a loud squeak coming from the living room, which he figured most likely came from Sonic attempting to close the door as quietly as he could.

Freezing in place, Tails listened intently, waiting for the best moment to follow Sonic without being seen.

Finally, after a few seconds pause, Tails heard the door shut, and he took his chance. Throwing the covers off of his body, Tails hopped out of his bed and rushed out of his room.

Once he managed to reach the nearest window, he quickly scanned the countryside around him, hoping to find out which direction Sonic was going so that he wasn't flying blind.

He eventually managed to spot Sonic out of the corner of his eye just as he began running towards the west. After realizing that he needed to get going immediately, Tails flung the door open and slipped through, closing it behind him before sprinting in the same direction as Sonic, hoping that he hadn't already lost the secretive hedgehog.

* * *

Although Tails was well aware of the fact that keeping up with Sonic was going to be difficult, going at it on foot was much more taxing than he originally thought it would be.

Thankfully, Tails was able to pick up some speed once he lifted off of the ground and began flying. As much as he knew that he was risking getting spotted by Sonic, it was the best option that the fox was able to come up with.

Anyway, Tails continued to follow Sonic as he continued to run, even managing to keep an eye on the hedgehog as he weaved through some scattered trees on the countryside.

Eventually, although Tails was confident that Sonic hadn't noticed him and didn't appear like he was trying to shake the pursuer off, Tails was beginning to wonder how long it was going to take before Sonic finally reached where he was going.

Finally, though, Sonic soon came to a stop in front of a large forest. Tails paused, hovering in midair as he watched what Sonic was doing, curious as he wondered what exactly was so important with this random forest that Sonic would be stopping here every night.

At first, Sonic looked like he was simply staring into the depths of the forest, lost in thought, but eventually, after staring at the moon in the sky for a few moments (making Tails almost believe that he was caught), Sonic jogged quickly into the forest, disappearing into the darkness.

Not wasting any time, Tails quickly landed right where Sonic was a few moments ago. He was about ready to head in to the forest, when a thought crept into the back of his mind that maybe it wasn't the best idea to go chasing after a freaked-out hedgehog into the middle of a dark forest without a plan to get out if needed.

Unfortunately, as much as Tails wanted to formulate a plan of action, he knew that the longer he waited in front of the forest, the more difficult it would be for him to find Sonic, so after letting out a heavy sigh, he jogged into the forest, heading in the same direction that he saw Sonic disappear into not too long ago.

* * *

Tails was beginning to regret waiting as long as he did to enter the forest, because as of yet he has found no sign of the blue hedgehog anywhere around him.

"Maybe I should just go home and wait for tomorrow. I might have a better chance of finding him in here if I don't lose him in the first place."

Tails paused in his tracks, realizing something weird.

"And now I'm talking to myself. Great work, Tails."

Sighing, Tails remained silent, deciding to spend a few more minutes searching before calling it a night.

To his surprise, though, those extra few minutes were just what Tails needed to find what he was looking for, as he suddenly spotted Sonic out in a clearing a few feet away from him.

Flying forwards, Tails hid behind a bush, finally looking forward to finding out exactly what Sonic was up to.

Silence fell as Tails stared at Sonic, afraid to make a sound that would tip the hedgehog off to his presence. He watched as Sonic continued to stare at the moon, almost wistfully (at least as far as Tails could tell considering Sonic was facing away from him).

It eventually ended up getting to the point where Tails was beginning to believe that he was being led on, considering nothing was happening. The fox was about ready to sneak off and begin making his way back home only to be stopped in his tracks by a loud yell.

Whipping around, Tails was met with the sight of Sonic on all fours, looking like he was in massive amounts of pain.

Tails briefly considered going out to help Sonic and try to figure out just what was wrong with him. That thought went out the window pretty much immediately when he heard a loud growl coming from Sonic's prone form and his fur began growing thicker.

"What the-"

Tails could only watch as his best friend turned into a hairy beast right in front of him. At first he couldn't help but be curious, wondering what exactly Sonic turned into, but when the beast turned around, and Tails got a good long look at the sharp teeth, razor sharp claws and completely white eyes, Tails's curiosity was overridden by fear.

Unable to move due to the fear consuming him, Tails could only watch as the beast sniffed around the area.

"Please don't smell me. Please don't smell me." Tails repeated inside his head, his eyes scrunched up as he waited for the end that at this point had a pretty good chance of coming.

However, to Tails's surprise, the embrace of death never came, as the loud growling that was coming from what was originally his best friend grew faint.

Slowly opening one of his eyes, Tails took a look around the area, soon realizing that the beast was no longer in the area.

Slightly surprised, Tails didn't exactly know what to do. At first, he considered going after the Sonic-beast, but he realized pretty quickly that it would be suicidal to go after him, especially with how freaked out he still was sharing space with a monster that looked like it could tear him apart like tissue paper.

In an attempt to keep his chattering teeth under control, Tails wrapped his arms around his body; hanging on to himself for dear life, as he felt like as long as he could feel himself, he knew he was still in one piece.

Picking himself up on shaky legs, Tails felt that it was probably best to leave if he wanted to live to see the morning, so he slowly turned himself around and began walking, his head spinning from the amount of stress he was going through.

However, Tails didn't get far before he heard a low growl. Freezing in place, Tails clutched himself even harder, trying his hardest to keep himself together so he doesn't freak out and start making mistakes that could lead to his death.

Unfortunately, there was absolutely no chance of that ever happening, as Tails's self-control went out the window once the Sonic-beast landed right in front of him.

Nearly tripping over himself, Tails screamed before bolting in the opposite direction.

The beast gave chase as Tails continued to run, trying his best not to panic and keep a cool head, as he would only get himself lost and end up as the beast's lunch if he wasn't paying attention to where he was going.

"Just need to get out of the trees and I'll be alright." he said to himself, repeating that sentence as a sort of mantra to keep himself going as he continued to pump his legs as hard as he could.

The beast, however, wasn't going to go down without a fight as it quite easily managed to keep up with Tails, although not quite enough to the point that it would be able to reach the fox and take him down.

* * *

As the chase continued, neither of them really could manage to gain any ground on each other, as any ground Tails managed to gain was pretty soon lost thanks to the werehog picking up speed.

"Sonic, please! Don't do this!" yelled Tails, hoping that he might be able to get through to the werehog.

Unfortunately, as with most times, talking to Sonic proved to be fruitless, as the werehog was still very much in control. This didn't deter Tails, though.

"It's me, Sonic! It's your best friend! Why don't you recognize me?!"

The werehog didn't even slow down an inch, but just as Tails was about to continue speaking, he suddenly noticed light start to poke through the trees in front of him.

"Yes! I'm almost there!"

With how long Tails was running, it surprised him to see that he wasn't out of breath yet, but once his mind drifted to that train of thought, he began to feel like he was wearing out.

"Oh no. Don't tire out now!" he thought to himself.

Forcing himself to push past his breaking point, Tails continued to head towards the exit to the forest, the werehog very close behind.

"Come on, come on! Push, Tails!"

Finally, the last tree flew by Tails, and the two-tailed fox immediately wound up his tails, lifting off of the ground as he flew away from the forest, the werehog watching him in confusion as he disappeared over the horizon.

* * *

Despite barely being able to exert any more energy, Tails refused to touch down until he finally managed to make it back to his house.

After finally landing on the ground in front of the door, Tails immediately collapsed to the ground, unable to muster the energy to open the front door and walk in.

However, as much as he wanted to sit down and calm his rapidly beating heart, he still didn't feel completely safe outside, so despite the lethargic feeling throughout most of his body, he somehow managed to pull himself up and open the door, slowly dragging himself through the door and shutting it behind him before collapsing on to the couch, clutching his chest as he tried to recover from the ordeal he just went through.

Eventually, with Tails too tired to process exactly just what went on, his eyes soon fell shut and he went to sleep, ready for the end of the one of the longest nights of his life.


	8. Chapter 8

Tails managed to get a few hours of sleep before he was rudely awoken by a poke in his side, followed by a voice that came through the haze of his not yet fully awake state.

"Tails, you awake? Yo, Tails!"

Tails's brain barely seemed to register that he was still sleeping on the couch before he finally looked towards who the voice belonged to, and what he saw (or rather, vaguely saw) made him fully wake up very quickly.

Before Sonic could say another word, Tails yelped in fright, falling off of the couch before quickly picking himself up and stumbling towards his room.

Confused, Sonic tried to chase after him, but Tails managed to beat him thanks to the fact that Sonic usually avoided going full speed inside their house because of the damage it caused.

Anyway, when Sonic finally reached the door to Tails's room, he was met with the door slamming in his face followed by the sound of the lock clicking into place.

"Go away!"

Sonic couldn't help but be hurt, wondering exactly what came over Tails to make him act this way. Of course, the argument they had yesterday didn't help, but at least Tails was still willing to be around him reluctantly. Now, though, it looks like Tails was too scared to be around him.

Sonic stood there, lost, as he tried to figure out what he could have done to frighten Tails this much. Unfortunately, that turned out to be a little tougher to figure out than Sonic thought, due to the fact that he had no idea about Tails's near-death experience last night.

"Tails, I'm right here if you want to talk. Did something happen yesterday?"

Sonic didn't hear any denial coming from the other side of the door, so he assumed that the answer must have been yes. The only problem was finding out what. The whimpering that Sonic could hear through the door worried him, as he wasn't sure if Tails was actually willing to talk.

Still, Sonic was undeterred, as he really didn't want to just leave Tails in this state.

"Come on, Tails, tell me what happened. I'm not going to be mad or anything. I just want to help."

As Sonic expected, no answer came from the hiding two-tailed fox, so he tried a different approach.

"Please, Tails, I can't help you if you don't tell me what's wrong. Seriously, you haven't been like this since we first met, and it's starting to worry me!"

"Nothing's wrong! Just stay away from me!"

Sonic quickly saw through Tails's poor attempt at an excuse. Sighing, he knew he wasn't going to get anywhere if the door was between them, so he grabbed the doorknob and twisted.

As expected, it didn't give, but the noise of the doorknob jiggling ended up giving Sonic just the clue he needed to figure out what was going on with Tails.

"No! Please! Don't kill me! I don't taste good!"

Admittedly, Sonic was confused at first, wondering why Tails thought he wanted to eat him, but then he put two and two together and his eyes widened in shock.

"Tails…did you-"

"You're a monster!"

Being labeled a monster stung greatly, but Sonic was more concerned about Tails more than his own feelings.

After making a mental note to apologize to Tails for it later, Sonic kicked the door open. Even though Tails tried his best to flee, Sonic successfully managed to catch him, grasping Tails in a firm hug as he tried to console the frightened fox.

"Shh…shh…it's okay. I'm not gonna hurt you."

Tails's attempts to wrest himself from Sonic's grip soon dissolved into quiet sobs as he finally managed to calm himself down.

Finally, Tails soon fell quiet, his crying barely audible to Sonic's ears. At first, Sonic began to think that Tails was going to be fine and he wouldn't have to worry about his state of mind anymore, but what Tails said next surprised him greatly.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

Caught off guard, Sonic didn't answer. He had an answer in mind, but what that answer is was something he really didn't want to admit in front of Tails's face. Sonic was well aware of how outlandish this whole curse deal was beginning to sound in his head, which ended up making it tougher for him to think that Tails would have acted any differently no matter if or when he told him.

Sonic remained silent hoping that Tails would give up and drop the subject, but the fox continued to look at him, expecting an answer.

"Tails…I-"

Sonic sighed, knowing that it wasn't worth trying to hide it anymore.

"Tails, I never told you or any of the others because I didn't think you'd believe me."

Tails's eyes widened, shocked to think that Sonic would think that way considering how long they've known each other. After wiping his eyes, Tails sat there, processing what Sonic said for a moment before speaking.

"Sonic, what makes you think I wouldn't believe you? We've known each other for over twenty years, and I've never seen you lie once!"

Tails looked at Sonic, expecting him to change his tone of voice now that he's shown that he's willing to believe the hedgehog, but to his surprise, Sonic remained nonplussed.

"Look Tails, thank you for trying to make me feel better, but I'm pretty sure what happened to me will make your head spin."

"Try me."

Sighing, Sonic recounted the story of how he ran into the werehog while running through Apotos, and as he expected, Tails looked skeptical. However, once he removed his glove and showed Tails the bite mark, that skepticism went right out of the window.

"This is why I've been going through so many gloves. Every time I transform, they're pretty much turned into shredded cloth. And as you can imagine, I didn't want you to see the bite mark. That would have led to a lot of questions."

"But…what about your shoes? From what I saw last night, it felt like the way you were growing would have destroyed them just like your gloves."

Sonic could only shrug.

"I have no idea. To be honest, I can't really tell you much about what happens whenever I transform. My mind goes blank when the werehog takes over, and the information I have right now I've discerned from what was around me when I changed back to normal in the morning."

Sonic fell silent for a few moments, collecting his thoughts before speaking again.

"I do have a bit of a confession to make, though."

Tails was surprised to hear how frank Sonic sounded when speaking. Remaining silent, Tails chose to listen as Sonic continued on.

"I think the werehog might have been the one who attacked Knuckles."

Now that Tails was aware of the fact that Sonic and the werehog were one and the same, he could see that the possibility of the werehog being the one who nearly killed Knuckles, but the fact that Sonic was willing to disclose this so easily still sent Tails for a loop.

"Recently, I've been waking up in that forest you found me in covered in blood. And when I saw-"

"Wait a minute, wait a minute. Was this why you've been spending so much time in the shower recently?" interrupted Tails.

Sonic nodded.

"I needed to wash the blood off. Believe me, I was just as shocked to find blood on me as much as you are right now. That forest you found me in was only the second forest I've been hiding in every night. I used to spend nights in that forest on the other side of town, but a lot of people were walking in that forest during the night time. Frankly, some of them were lucky to get out alive!"

Sonic was nearly beginning to get hysterical from the amount of pressure he was going through trying to deal with this predicament he was in.

"Sonic, are you telling me that guy we saw on TV-"

"Yeah, I'm almost completely sure that the werehog killed him."

It was Sonic's turn to break down, as the stress he was going through was starting to really get to him. Tails stared at Sonic crying for a few minutes, unable to process the fact that the hedgehog in front of him that was normally so good at hiding his emotions was now a blubbering mess in front of him.

Leaning forwards, Tails wrapped an arm around Sonic, doing his best to comfort the stressed out hedgehog.

Eventually, Sonic's tears subsided, and once they finally stopped, he picked himself up and slowly breathed in and out, calming himself down.

"Thanks, Tails. I guess we each need our moment, I suppose."

"Yeah…"

The two of them fell silent, neither of them really knowing what else to say after the big display the two of them just went through.

"So…what do we do now?" asked Tails.

"Huh?"

"What do we do? I mean, there's got to be some way to help you get rid of this…affliction, I guess I'll call it."

"I…don't know."

Sonic fell silent once again, lost in thought. He admittedly was way too busy dealing with the actual curse itself to see if there was any way that he could finally become a normal hedgehog again and not have to deal with transforming into a monster every night.

"To be honest, I don't know if there is any way to do this. It feels like this is something that hasn't happened since the Dark Ages, and who knows if there are any books that tell those kind of things?" he said.

"Well, we can't let it stop us. I'm sure we'll find some way to get you back to normal, Sonic." said Tails, looking determined as he spoke.

Even though Sonic still felt like he didn't have much of a chance to break the werehog curse, he couldn't help but feel warm inside knowing that Tails was more than willing to help.

"Thanks, Tails. I appreciate it. Really, I do."

Though Sonic was still walking on eggshells after finding out that he nearly traumatized the poor kid with his werehog problem, thankfully Tails appeared to be alright.

As the two of them walked out of Tails's room and headed back into the main room of the house to prepare breakfast, Sonic turned towards Tails, realizing that he forgot to say something to him.

"Hey, sorry about the door by the way. I can fix it for you if you don't mind me borrowing some of your tools."

"No, it's fine, Sonic. I'll fix it. Just be careful next time if you need to kick down one of the doors in our house. I noticed that you knocked it off of one of the hinges."

Sonic slowly shook his head in bemusement, thankful that Tails seemed to be back to his normal self.


	9. Chapter 9

Breakfast between the two best friends went pretty smoothly, although the air was a little tense between them.

Sonic was trying to keep his mind off of what just happened earlier by wolfing down his food, but he couldn't really resist glancing at Tails every so often, checking to make sure that he was still alright.

As for Tails himself, while he still remembered the fact that he was completely safe from the werehog while the sun was out, it still didn't help the fox's nerves, as he gave Sonic nervous looks every so often, expecting the werehog to burst out and maul him without warning.

Thankfully, Sonic remained just as blue as ever, and as he finished off his food and went to clean his plate off, he turned towards Tails, who was still absentmindedly picking at his eggs.

"So, you want to go do something today?"

Tails was slightly surprised to hear what Sonic said, as he was pretty convinced that Sonic was itching to find out how to break his werehog curse.

"What's with the change of heart? The way you were acting before, you looked like you really wanted to find out how to fix what happened to you."

Sonic paused, realizing that comment was kind of true.

"Well yeah, I do, but we're not in any real hurry. Besides, I think we both need a bit of a de-stress moment."

Tails could definitely see Sonic's point. This new knowledge of Sonic's condition was a bit overbearing. However, before he could decide what to do, he suddenly yawned.

"You tired, buddy? Maybe you should go take a nap. We can do something later, alright?"

"Yeah, you're right. I didn't get a whole lot of sleep last night, for obvious reasons."

Sonic rolled his eyes before lightly pushing Tails towards the bedrooms. However, to Tails's surprise, Sonic was pushing the fox towards his own room.

"Sonic, you do realize my room's over there, right?"

"Yeah, I know. I just want you to have a little quiet time, and you can't really have it with the door hanging off of one hinge, right?"

Tails paused for a moment, realizing that he completely forgot about the fact that his door was busted thanks to the jumble of thoughts that was going through his brain at the moment. After making a mental note to search for his hammer when he woke up, Tails turned towards Sonic.

"G'night, Sonic. Thanks for this."

"No problem, bud. I'll be out in the living room if you need me."

Tails closed the door behind him as he walked over towards Sonic's bed.

As for Sonic himself, he waited a couple of more minutes to make sure that Tails wasn't going to pop right back out of his room before he could leave. When the door didn't open back up, Sonic assumed that Tails must have fallen asleep, so he quietly snuck back to the living room as he promised, hopping on to the couch and flipping on the TV as he kicked his feet up on top of the coffee table.

* * *

A few hours later, even Sonic managed to fall asleep thanks to the long night he had last night. After spreading himself out on the couch, Sonic's eyes closed.

Before he could take a nap, though, his ears picked up the sound of the bedroom door opening nearby. Sonic debated for a few moments whether to just simply continue sleeping, but as Tails walked into the living room, he decided to open his eyes once more to greet his friend.

"Well good afternoon, sleepyhead. You ready to head out and do something?"

Sonic sat up from his original position on the couch and was about to jump up to head towards the door when Tails spoke up.

"Maybe later, Sonic. I want to get my door fixed before I forget."

Even though Sonic was slightly disappointed, he figured there was no reason not to let Tails do what he felt that he needed to do. Still, he did feel the need to remind Tails about his issue, though.

"Okay. Don't take too long, though. You know what happens after dark."

Tails didn't look too thrilled about Sonic bringing up his werehog problem, but the fox chose to ignore that comment and continued speaking.

"Don't worry Sonic, I won't. I just have to find where my screwdriver went."

As Tails headed towards his workshop to find said tools, he looked towards Sonic once more."

"Hey, if you want to go ahead and take a nap, feel free. I saw you were lying down as I was coming in."

Sonic was pleasantly surprised to see how perceptive Tails was becoming, smiling as he decided to follow along with Tails's idea. As the two-tailed fox went through the door to his workshop, Sonic readjusted himself to the most comfortable position he could manage, closing his eyes once more as he rested his hand on top of his face, finally falling asleep after a long time coming.

* * *

Sonic woke up a couple of hours later to the sound of silence. Confused, he sat up and looked around the room, noticing after a few seconds that the TV was turned off.

"Huh. Did I turn that off?"

It was definitely possible that he might have accidentally hit the power button on the remote while he was asleep, but that wasn't really something that Sonic was too concerned with.

What he really was concerned with was the fact that the entire house was quiet. He clearly remembered the fact that him and Tails were going to go out and do something to get their minds off of his werehog problem once Tails managed to fix the door. For some reason, though, there was no noise coming from the bedroom area.

Shrugging, Sonic decided to go check it out, thinking that Tails must have already finished the job.

When he finally made his way to said hallway, he found that the door was already back on its hinges, and he quickly tested it out to make sure it still worked.

"Looks like the door's fixed. Now where is he?" he said to himself.

Sonic quickly made his way through the house, checking each of the rooms that he could have possibly been in. It got to the point where Sonic was beginning to think that something might be wrong, but thankfully just when he was about to panic and rush out the door to find him, Tails came in through the front door clutching a large bag of groceries in his hands.

"There you are. Where've you been? I've been looking all over for you."

Tails gave Sonic a look, slightly annoyed that the hedgehog didn't exactly put two and two together after seeing what he was carrying, but he chose to simply follow along, not wanting to cause a scene.

"Grocery shopping. We were running low on some stuff."

"Well, why didn't you tell me? I assumed that you and I would be heading out once you got that door fixed."

"Well, I would've, but…you looked like you were pretty heavily asleep. I didn't want to wake you up just to take you shopping." said Tails sheepishly.

Sonic stared at Tails for a few moments before looking away, shaking his head in bemusement.

"You need any help with that?" he asked, pointing towards the bag in Tails's hands.

"Naw, I'm good. Thanks, though."

As Tails walked over to the kitchen and began storing all of the groceries in their proper places, he looked up to where Sonic was standing as he spoke once more.

"Hey, once I get these all put away, how about we go head out and spend some time together like we were planning? I know we're not gonna have a whole lot of time before dark, but at least we'd have some free time."

"Sounds good. You know any places we could go?"

Tails paused as he considered what to say next.

"No, not really. I haven't thought about any. Do you have any?"

"I know just the place." said Sonic, a smile on his face.

"And?"

"It's a surprise, dude. Gotta make things at least somewhat interesting before we're pretty much bookworms for the next while, right?"

"I guess so."

Tails couldn't help but be a little curious as to what Sonic had in mind, but he figured that it wasn't going to be much longer before they actually go there, so he continued to put their groceries away, wondering just exactly how this plan of his was going to be interesting.

Thankfully, it didn't take much longer for Tails to finish his work, so once he finally stuck the last item into its proper place, he walked over to where Sonic was in front of the door, waiting impatiently for the two-tailed fox to finish.

"All done. Lead the way, I suppose." said Tails, reluctantly holding out his arm.

However, Sonic didn't immediately grab Tails's arm and run, though. Instead, he stared at it for a few seconds before looking at Tails's face.

"You sure? I've got nothing against you if you want to follow behind me."

"No, it's fine. You leading the way will get us there faster. Besides, I'm sure you want to spend as much free time with me until nightfall as I do with you."

Sonic paused for a few moments before shrugging, lightly grabbing Tails's arm as he led him out of the door. Once Sonic closed the door behind him, Sonic shot off, keeping an iron grip on Tails as he led him to where the hedgehog had planned for them to go.

* * *

A little while later, Sonic finally came to a stop, and once Tails's head stopped spinning, he was finally able to figure out exactly where Sonic had taken him.

"The lake? Hmm…I guess this can be a pretty nice place to relax. Kind of surprised you decided to go here, though. What about you little…*ahem*…water problem?"

"Tails, that's only for actually going into the water. We're just going to rest off to the side."

"Oh, okay. Sorry for bringing that up." said Tails, scratching the back of his neck nervously.

Sonic remained silent, the look on his face telling Tails that he wanted to drop the subject pretty quickly before things got awkward.

Thankfully, Tails got the hint, and he clammed up. Once the two of them got close enough to the water so that Sonic was going to immediately freak out, they lied down on the grass, staring into the sky as they took in the sights.

A few minutes passed as neither of them spoke, as they were too busy enjoying the silence around them. Eventually, though, Tails decided to speak up.

"This is pretty nice. Don't you think so?"

"Yep."

"You know, I don't know why I didn't think of doing this more. It's actually pretty relaxing."

"Well, now you know why I do this so often."

Tails nodded, realizing that Sonic had the right idea. Getting out every so often was a really nice way to de-stress.

Unfortunately, as much as Tails wanted to spend the rest of the day here doing nothing, he soon began to notice the fact that it was getting dark.

He looked over to his left, expecting to see Sonic already gone to the forest to transform, but to his surprise, he found the hedgehog completely zoned out, still lying down on the ground.

"Yo, Sonic!" he said, waving his hand in front of Sonic's face to get his attention.

"Huh? What's going on?"

"It's getting dark. You need to get out of here." said Tails, sounding slightly disappointed as he spoke.

It took a few seconds for it to register in Sonic's brain, but he soon swore loudly when he realized how late it was. He quickly got to his feet, and prepared to speed off as he headed to the forest.

"Sorry to leave you behind like this, Tails! I gotta jet!"

As Sonic sped away, Tails stared at his retreating form, wishing that he still had some more time to spend with him. However, those negative feelings didn't last very long, though.

As Tails began walking back towards home, he decided that there was no real reason to continue to wait on researching a cure for Sonic. So, with a new resolve, he promised himself that he was going to get started right away on the research.


	10. Chapter 10

It was a stormy night inside the confines of Station Square. Everyone was inside their homes, trying to keep out of the constant downpour that was affecting the city.

Surprisingly, not everyone was in their homes, though, as there was a small figure deep in the woods on the opposite side of town, a few miles from where Sonic and Tails lived.

"Hello?"

The figure called out to nowhere in particular, the light orange coloring revealing that he was in fact Tails.

As Tails walked through the forest attempting to find the exit, his senses were on high alert for the other occupant of the forest. He had absolutely no idea how he had managed to find himself back to the place where he nearly died at the hands of his feral best friend, but he couldn't really think about it for long, as he suddenly heard growling coming from somewhere around him.

"Oh no! Oh god, I have to get out of here!" he thought to himself as he desperately searched for a way out.

Unfortunately, the torrential downpour combined with the sheer darkness of the forest made it difficult for him to find his way around.

Tails eventually decided to just pick a direction and hope for the best, running off as soon as he decided. However, the growling soon grew in intensity, which terrified the young fox.

Nearly tripping over himself, Tails continued to run, dodging trees every so often as the growling became even louder.

In his haste to escape, though, he failed to notice a root sticking out of the ground that his left foot went right under, sending him falling flat on his face.

In the panicked state that he was in, though, he failed to register the fact that his foot was now stuck under a root, and in his attempt to crawl away and get back to his feet, he accidentally ended up twisting his ankle, making things even worse.

"AGH! God, why?" yelled Tails as pain shot through his leg.

Tails tried his best to endure the pain as he attempted to hobble away, but by the time he managed to get anywhere, he had already fallen again, and as he turned around, he was met with the terrifying visage of the werehog heading right towards him.

* * *

"Tails! Tails, wake up!"

Tails's mind barely registered those words, as he was still very much in the middle of his current predicament. However, he was finally able to return to the land of the living when he registered a sharp pain across his cheek.

As Tails finally managed to wake up, his blurry eyes registered a blue hedgehog in front of him. However, in his barely awake state, his mind immediately went to thinking it was the werehog again.

Before he could try to run away, though, Sonic immediately grabbed him by the arm, holding him back. Tails desperately tried pulling his arm away from Sonic's grip, but eventually Sonic was forced to resort to drastic measures, reeling back and slapping Tails in the face as hard as he could with his free hand.

That slap ended up bringing Tails back to reality, and once he managed to calm himself down, he looked behind him to find Sonic on the couch behind him, shaking his hand out from the sting the slap caused.

"Sorry about having to slap you there, bro. Needed to bring you back somehow."

"It's fine." said Tails, his voice cracking.

"But seriously, though. Were you having a nightmare? You were tossing and turning like crazy. Frankly, I'm surprised you didn't fall off of the couch!"

Tails looked down and found that he was indeed sleeping on the couch to his surprise. He vaguely remembered coming back home not too long after Sonic left last night. He thought that he managed to make it all the way to his bed, but he must have not have made it that far.

"Yo, Tails! Don't zone out on me, here." said Sonic, snapping his fingers in front of Tails's face to catch his attention.

Instead of answering, Tails simply nodded, confirming Sonic's suspicions.

"What was it about? Come on, you can tell me."

Sonic had a pretty good idea of what it was about considering what happened, but he wanted to hear it straight from his friend's mouth instead of assuming what it was.

Unfortunately Tails didn't answer. The two-tailed fox had a look on his face that reminded Sonic of someone who's just been through hell, and it made the hedgehog very nervous.

As much as Sonic wanted to accuse him of lying about how his episode with the werehog affected him, his brotherly instincts overrode everything else when he realized what was going on with Tails.

Quickly racking his brain to come up with a solution, Sonic reached forwards and grabbed Tails by the chin, raising it up so that the two of them were eye-to-eye.

"Tails, listen to me. You've got nothing to be afraid of. I promise. I told you before that I'm no threat to your safety all the way out in that forest when I transform."

"But…but what happens if the werehog gets out of the forest? I saw it come out when I was flying away that night." said Tails meekly.

"You'll be fine. The forest is miles away from here. There's no way the werehog will find this place before sunrise."

Sonic could tell from the look on Tails's face that he wasn't convinced. Frankly, Sonic wasn't convinced, either, considering he knew next to nothing about what the werehog does at night besides eat. Still, he needed to do something so that his buddy didn't end up an emotional wreck.

Sonic sighed heavily, realizing that keeping Tails safe, as well as sane, was going to be a lot more difficult than he originally thought.

"Look, I can tell that you're not convinced. That's fine. It's tough for me to believe, too. But I promise that I will do everything in my power to get rid of this affliction so that you don't have to be afraid anymore."

"But how are you going to be able to do this by yourself? I've never even heard of a werehog before yesterday. What makes you think that they'd have something about how to cure something as crazy as this?" asked Tails.

"I'm not doing this by myself, remember? We agreed to work together on this. So what do you say? Do you want to start working on this?" asked Sonic, mustering up as much enthusiasm as he could manage.

Tails paused, considering Sonic's words. Eventually, he stood up from the couch, wiping his eyes with his arm before finally looking at Sonic.

"Okay. I'll help."

Sonic wasn't exactly pleased with Tails's lack of enthusiasm, but he figured that it at least was a start. However, before he could make his way towards the door, Sonic stopped himself, realizing that there was something else that needed taken care of.

"Dude, you should probably go ahead and clean yourself up. You don't look too good right now."

Tails paused, looking in a nearby window and finding that he did indeed look like crap. The fur on his face was matted with sweat, and he looked like he barely managed to get any sleep in.

Without saying anything, Tails walked off towards the bathroom.

Once Sonic heard the sound of the door shutting, he exhaled heavily before flopping on to the couch, pressing his hands to his face to relieve the headache that was coming on.

"God, this sucks. I should have just told him." he said, smacking the end of the couch in anger.

Sonic knew that just telling Tails right away probably wouldn't have made much of a difference. He still would have had a hell of a time getting Tails to believe him, but at least there was still a better chance that he wouldn't have had to deal with nearly getting eviscerated by the werehog.

Sonic smacked the couch a few more times to let off some steam before he finally managed to calm himself down enough so that his thoughts remained rational.

Thankfully, he managed to do it just in time, though, as he heard the door to the bathroom open a few seconds later, with Tails appearing around the corner not too long after.

Sonic stood up almost immediately before taking a look at Tails to see how he was doing. While Tails still did have the despondent look on his face that he had after waking up this morning, he was at least clean enough that people wouldn't start asking questions.

"You ready to go, bud?" he asked as he wrapped an arm around Tails's shoulders, being as fatherly as possible to avoid causing more problems.

Tails paused, giving Sonic a blank look before finally nodding.

"Yeah, let's go."

Sonic was still a little nervous about the state the young fox was in, but he figured that some fresh air would at least hopefully help Tails out.

* * *

As Sonic and Tails walked down the path towards the city, neither of them spoke. Tails was still freaked out from the nightmare, so his nerves were on a hair trigger. Every so often, he glanced over at Sonic, thinking that the werehog was going to pop out and maul him, but thankfully nothing had happened so far.

As for Sonic himself, he was too concerned for Tails's wellbeing to think of anything substantial to say. Whenever Sonic took a look over to his side to see how his buddy was doing, Tails had the same blank look on his face. Sonic wasn't exactly sure if that was a bad thing or a good thing, but then again, he couldn't really read minds, so he hoped that it wasn't anything bad.

Eventually, once the two of them reached the city limits, Sonic stopped in his tracks, forcing Tails to quickly backpedal to return to his side. The two of them were silent for a few moments, as Tails wasn't really in the mood to say anything. Soon enough, though, to Sonic's surprise Tails suddenly spoke up.

"Do you know where we're going? We've been standing here for a few minutes already."

"Oh! Uh…yeah, I do. I figured we could probably head to the library…do some research. The only problem is I don't exactly remember where it is."

Tails sighed before stepping forwards.

"Do you want me to lead the way?"

Sonic was pleasantly surprised to see how forward Tails was being, especially after the way he was earlier.

"You sure? I don't mind leading the way so you can take it easy, especially after what you've been through."

"I'm alright, Sonic. I can handle myself."

The look on Tails's face said otherwise, but Sonic decided to go ahead and trust him, thinking that it could help him get some of his confidence back.

"Sure, go ahead."

Tails nodded before stepping forwards some more, taking the lead as the two of them headed towards the Station Square Library, both of them hoping that there was at least something in there that could help with the werehog lurking beneath.


End file.
